"O Daniel!" she said to herself, trembling all over,--"O Daniel! my only
friend upon earth, what would you suffer if you knew that you lost me
forever by the very means you chose to secure my safety!"

To refuse the assistance offered her by Papa Ravinet would have required
an amount of energy which she did not possess. The voice of reflection
continually said to her,--

"The old man is your only hope."

It never occurred to her to conceal the truth from Papa Ravinet, or to
deceive him by a fictitious story. She only thought how she could tell
him the truth without telling him all; how she could confess enough to
enable him to serve her, and yet not to betray a secret which she held
more dear than her happiness, her reputation, and life itself.

Unfortunately, she was the victim of one of those intrigues which are
formed and carried out within the narrow circle of a family,--intrigues
of the most abominable character, which people suspect, and often even
know perfectly well, and which yet remain unpunished, because they
cannot be reached by the law.

Henrietta's father, Count Ville-Handry, was in 1845 one of the
wealthiest land-owners of the province of Anjou. The good people near
Rosiers and Saint Mathurin were fond of pointing out to strangers the
massive towers of Ville-Handry, a magnificent castle half hid among
noble old woods on the beautiful slopes of the bluffs which line the
Loire.

"There," they said, "lives a true gentleman, a little too proud,